So Spicy You'd Die / 辣死你

This is originally one of my Mom's inventions. Growing up, there were actually two versions of the dish in my family: 辣死你 (literally translates to "So Spicy You'd Die") for the adults versus 一點點辣 (translates to "Just a Little Bit Spicy") for the kids. Here is my version:

Recipe: So Spicy You'd Die / 辣死你

Ingredients:

1 bunch of mustard greens
4 red chili peppers
salt
olive oil
dried red chili pepper flakes (optional)

Directions:

Wash and dry mustard greens. In large sized bowl, layer mustard greens and lightly sprinkle salt on every layer. Use your hands to rub in the salt to all corners. If necessary, break mustard greens in half to fit the bowl. Cover and refrigerate over night.

Take out the mustard greens. The salt should have extracted a lot of liquid from the mustard greens, which now appear a little shriveled. Drain the salty liquid from bowl.

Boil water in medium sized pot. Blanche mustard greens in boiling water. Take out the mustard greens and squeeze gently to get rid of any excess liquid. Caution, the vegetable may be hot from the water. You can wrap a paper towel around the leaves so you don't touch them directly. The mustard greens are now only half the size of their fresh counterparts.

Chop mustard greens into bite sizes. Wash and pat dry red chili peppers. Chop peppers. Keep all the seeds with the pepper pieces.

Heat up olive oil in wok or fry pan. Once oil is hot, add peppers. Stir fry till you can smell the aroma of peppers. Add mustard greens. If desired, add dried chili pepper flakes. Stir fry on medium high heat until everything is done.

Serve and enjoy! It works best as a side dish to rice and other entrees. My family enjoys it both hot and cold. Due to the salt and the chili peppers, the dish can usually be preserved for 5-7 days in the fridge.

Note: If you don't have the time or the fridge space for the salt process, you can use my mother's original method instead. She poured boiling water directly over raw mustard greens in the sink to shrivel them up and added salt separately in the stir-fry process. Just make sure your sink is deep enough that you won't end up splashing hot water all over yourself! When I was living alone in a studio, I had a tiny sink that could barely hold a colander, so I speak from experience (which was what drove me to develop the salt method!).